Author's note:
Thank you all for your reviews! They are very entertaining to read. I'm glad to hear you're enjoying the ridiculous exploits of our skunk-haired doofus.
A few of the tributes in this story are parodies of characters from other sources, specifically Happy Sugar Life, Harry Potter, Heathers and Arcane.
If you know them, great! If not, don't worry, it won't affect the story.
All the other characters are either from the original Hunger Games, OCs, inserts of friends, and – of course – my fabulous self-insert.
Now, I shall hand you back to the wonderful Mudnut.
Chapter 3
Before I know it, I'm being bundled onto the train with a miserable-looking Haymitch.
Effie Trinket totters behind us, arms stiff, hands pointing outwards. She gives me the impression of a rather camp penguin.
We enter a lavishly upholstered carriage with a mahogany table in the centre, lined with plush velvet seats.
Haymitch plonks down on one side, I on the other. Effie looks between us, pouting discontentedly. After a second of debate, she sits beside Haymitch. I'm not offended – she would rather look across at me than him, I'm sure.
Haymitch reclines and takes a swig from a bottle of wine on the table. Effie scrunches up her face at his manners.
He sprays a shower of red droplets all over me, proclaiming, "What percendage is this? Gimme somethig stronger will you?" He gestures to an Avox in a corner, "God knows I need it."
I sit agape, drenched.
"Look what you've do.ne to my suit!" I say, "Are you trying to humiliate me?"
"You did that yourself, cuzzy."
The words confuse me. They came from Pinty, who stands in a corner, arms folded. I didn't notice her until she spoke.
Haymitch lets out a raucous laugh.
"I like dis gul." He says.
I observantly notice that he's started to slur.
I decide to take pity on him and help him.
"Haymitch, I know this day must be hard for you because it reminds you of your own Reaping, but you've got to stop drinking. Do you want to look like a bumbling klutz when we arrive in the Capitol?"
"I'm not drinking 'cause uv the Reaping. I'm drink - drunk – 'cause uv you…. Midnut."
Suddenly reassured, I grin. "Oh! Good-luck drinks?! Sick! Why didn't you offer me some?"
He scoffs, "Good lug? Why would I wid you lug?"
"Luck in winning the games." I explain.
He raises his eyebrows.
Pinty snaps, "You thick or somethin', fam? He's hammered 'cuz he's gotta deal with you for the next few weeks. Or days."
"Days?" I ask. We don't enter the games for a couple of weeks.
"Don't chat bull, fam. We all know you won't last through training."
I reply, "Oh Pinty, the tributes aren't allowed to attack each other in training. And for me to keel over and die in the middle of a training session is highly improbable."
"You sayin' I'm wrong? You lying, fam."
"I'm not lying, it's just-"
Pinty steps forward and looms over me. She fills her cheeks with air and shoots her next word in my face.
" Pussio."
She gives a satisfied smile at my bewilderment.
Pinty remains leaning over me and I'm unsure how she wants me to respond.
"Well then…" Effie tentatively tugs Pinty away.
Pinty shrugs her off and stands with her hands in her pockets. Despite the fact that we've started moving along the track, Pinty manages to stay balanced without sitting down.
Effie suggests that we all watch the other Reaping ceremonies to focus and calm down.
They play the ceremonies in reverse order, and I watch as I mishear the name Effie called. I glare at her so she knows she's to blame.
Now time to see who the other tributes are. I am both excited and nervous to see my competition.
My mind is immediately put at ease when I see the girl tribute from District Eleven mount the stage. Anita Meat – not a fitting name, as she's all skin and bone. I'm sure a mild gust of wind would snap her in two. She has pale skin and straight white hair that hangs from beneath a bucket hat.
Pinty scoffs when the girl says a teary goodbye to a warty-looking toad – presumably her pet – and walks straight to the train without a single person wishing her luck.
The male tribute could not be more different to Anita.
Rubis Thatcher. His name boasts of strength and stoicism. Standing over seven feet tall, his mane of thick, pecan hair falls past his shoulders, his jawline square, with eyes that reflect years of toiling in the fields under the blazing sun.
I let out an involuntary squeak when his sparkling pewter eye catches a glance at the camera.
My heartbeat suddenly races and I become weak in the knees. I can't take my eyes off of his muscles…
Haymitch lets forth another spew of alcohol directly onto me. Some drips into my ear.
"Did you mean tuh say thad oud loud?" he guffaws.
I slap my hand over my mouth.
"No! I mean, I was just… He's strong!" I say smoothly, "I was… Acknowledging that he's fair competition, that's all. No match for me though. And for crying out loud, stop spitting on me!"
As the presenters talk about the District Eleven tributes, the Avox girl approaches with a cloth to help me clean up.
I wouldn't normally pay much attention to the servants of the Capitol, but this Avox is impossible to ignore. She has bright tangerine hair, more frizzy and voluminous than Effie's teetering wig.
As she leans over me, dabbing at my sodden clothes, her hair obscures my vision as though I'm being attacked by a frizzy, sentient hedge. I splutter and try to duck backwards, hitting my head on the window and failing to wriggle out of range.
I open my mouth to protest at this foul treatment and immediately inhale a mouth-full of orange.
Choking, I shove the imbecile off of me and she catches her balance on the table. A glass falls to the floor and shatters.
"You clumsy oaf!" I say, "What good are you if you can't clean up a mess without making more?"
The speechless girl looks at me haughtily, as if to blame me for the shattered glass, then walks into another carriage to retrieve a dustpan and brush.
Her mass of hair rustles irately as she leaves. I shake my head and return my attention to the Reaping Ceremonies.
The District Ten tributes are called Minx and Mace.
Minx is a sallow-skinned girl with two calf-length, electric-blue plaits and a steam-punk, homemade outfit. Her energy is divided between acting thrilled for the Games, panicked at the audience, and hateful towards her District partner.
He, on the other hand, is a well-dressed young man with close-cropped brown hair and a square figure. Excluding the occasional scowl at Minx, Mace appears rather solemn about the whole event.
The next two tributes almost blow me off my seat. It's as though we've been transported from Panem to some other world where humanity has devolved to it's crudest form.
The girl – Bretta – wears worn grey clothes that sag off her body like rhino skin, yet are still less misshapen than her facial features. Her hair is the colour of dusty, rotted wood, matching her squinting eyes and yellowed teeth.
A cloud of vape billows around her head and my eyes drift to the male tribute.
I try to blink sleep from my eyes without success, realising that I can't clear the distortion because it's not me, it's him. His excessively receding hairline and bulging eyes remind me of a grasshopper, except his limbs are even more twig-like than that.
Even his name is hard to process; a concoction of k-, th- and y- sounds.
I decide to call him Yucky.
Effie chuckles.
"What?" Pinty demands.
"Oh, I was just amused by the notion that they could compete in looks with two people in this carriage." She smiles.
I say, "I agree with you on Haymitch, but there's no need to be so rude about Pinty. She hasn't yet reached the age where she realises an eyepatch isn't socially-"
"Shut up fam; she ain't chattin' about me."
I attempt to respond to Pinty, but the Avox has returned to sweep up the glass. Even while crouched on the floor, her hair manages to smother my face as she sweeps.
Nevertheless, I'm glad that Effie's joke seems to have gone over Pinty's head. If she had made a joke about my appearance, I would have been quite reasonably offended.
We turn our attention back to the screen.
The District Eight tributes are pretty boring. A mysterious guy in a trench coat, and his preppy girlfriend, who wears a short skirt and padded blue blazer.
District Seven presents a pair of Gothic, punky-looking kids, called Izzie and Corvid. Though the two say nothing out loud, an expression passes between them as though they've known each other a long time. They look determined, and I have to wonder whether it's possible for a couple of Goth kids to pose an actual threat.
A threat that I definitely don't have to wonder about is a tribute from the next district; Six. I can't tell what gender either of the tributes are, but one is terrifyingly built like a concrete steamroller.
Their district partner is half their height, skinny with red hair and a flickering grin that puts me on edge.
The tributes from Five are ten times more astonishing.
The girl's name is, simply, Blue. She is the shortest person I have ever seen. Her thin, light blue hair hangs in a limp ponytail, and dark glasses cover her eyes. Even through the TV screen, I can't help but feel uneasy at the sight of her.
She has to be guided up onto the stage, and holds a cane in front of her. It's then that I realise she is blind.
"Man's betting she's a gonner straight up." Pinty inputs.
"I wouldn't be so sure." Effie interjects, "District Five have a history of churning out mutations. Apparently, as the power district, they have been attempting to take over District Thirteen's industry of nuclear technology. There may be more to that girl than meets the eye – no pun intended."
I squint at the screen, but I can't see anything more than an underdeveloped blind girl.
Then Effie is proven absolutely correct when Blue's district partner is chosen.
The male tribute for District Five – 'male' being used in the very loose sense of the word – is not a human.
It is a lizard.
A lizard person. Human reptile. Scaly, fanged, slit-eyed. A monster.
It's name is Carni. I struggle to comprehend that I will be entering the arena with this mutated beast.
However, my mind is put at ease when the camera moves on to District Four. This is the start of the careers– those who train their whole lives for the Games.
With any luck, I will be able to use my charisma and guile to charm my way among them. I would be a major asset to their team. Then, when it is only the careers left, I shall have to put aside my empathy and dispatch them all to win.
As my master plan constructs itself in my mind, the Avox girl stands and buffets me with her hair. This is the last straw.
"Wha-"
My mouth fills with frizz.
I duck away and stand next to Pinty at the end of the carriage.
"What is your problem?" I enquire of the Avox.
Pinty says, "Yeah fam, let him sit down. Man don't want him near me innit."
The girl looks at us.
I say, "Why is your hair, like, a literal canopy?"
She vainly tosses her head so her hair bounces around her.
"Seriously, get it cut. It's making you even more clumsy than you already are."
Effie chides me, "Don't talk to the staff, Midnight. It is unseemly. Although, I must say I quite agree with you; a face-full of hair is the last thing I expect from a servant of the Capitol."
"And when you get a new cut, dye it too, cuz." Pinty adds.
I take Effie's advice and don't talk directly to the girl.
"Yeah, she looks like a clown, doesn't she?"
The others nod in agreement, even Haymitch.
"Ex- CUSE me!"
A tiny, unrecognisable voice emits from the Avox, without her opening her mouth.
It speaks again.
"I am not putting up with this assault right now."
The orange hedge rustles and a furry face emerges from below the girl's ear.
Effie shrieks and scampers over to me and Pinty.
Haymitch takes a while to process the rodent on the girl's shoulder.
"I'm not dealing wid hallucinashuns toduh."
He promptly faceplants the table.
Before us is a brown guineapig with beady black eyes and floppy ears. It makes eye-contact with me and seems to give a little smile.
The disconcerting thing is, the tiny voice we heard was emitting from it.
Even more disconcerting; the Avox appears utterly unphased by – no, fond of – the creature.
It's bucktoothed mouth opens and it says, "Stop telling my Elspeth what to do."
Elspeth? Is that the Avox?
"First you kidnap her for her underwhelming art skills, then you cut out her tongue to stop her singing, and now you want her to cut her hair? Sure, it's messy, she spends two hours a day brushing it when she should be working, and it gets in the way of her chores. But it's my home. And making Elspeth an Avox shouldn't punish me as well.
"Plus, you're all in no place to judge others. You-" the guineapig twitches its nose at Effie, "have way more horrific hair than this nest of mine."
"How dare you!" Effie scoffs.
"And you know what? You have split ends."
This sends Effie gasping to the floor, clutching at her heart.
The guineapig looks at Pinty, "You look more like a rat than I do, but at least I have two eyes."
Pinty shrugs.
"Man can't argue with that, no lie."
"He-" It turns it's nose up at Haymitch, "is such a bad parent he'd rather be unconscious than talk to his son."
"Thank you ." I sigh, "At least you see how much of a monster he-"
"And you…" the thing looks me straight in the eye, "Have the most ridiculous, wannabe-edgy, quirky-white-girl name I have ever heard."
I make a sound in protest.
"Well what's your name then, if it's so much better?"
"Bickett."
"Elspeth and Bickett? And my name's stupid?!" I cry.
Bickett smirks and tugs on Elspeth's hair.
"Come on Elspeth, let's get this glass in the bin and eat leftover lettuce while we cry together."
With that, the Avox and her rat disappear from the room.
"Well I never…" Says Effie.
By now we have missed the Reapings for Districts Four, Three and Two.
The last two tributes stand on the stage of District One, which is rather more grand than the other districts we've seen.
One is a fifteen-year old girl named Sugar. She has bubble-gum-pink hair that reaches her waist, with two space-buns on top. She's the prettiest girl I've ever seen – not encrusted with coal like the ones in district Twelve.
She looks completely and utterly calm, a small smile playing on her lips. I can't help looking at her large eyes and unblemished skin, admiring her beauty. Then my mind drifts to the bronzed, sun-kissed skin of Rubis.
I snap my attention back to the TV.
The male tribute. Salto.
He can't be older than twelve, and has the wide blue eyes of an innocent child. Dark blue hair frames his face.
Salto looks up at Sugar as the two hold hands on the stage. I'm intrigued by the nature of their relationship – they don't look to be related.
Most importantly though, it looks like District One has a weak contribution this year. I can't speak for the rest of the career pack – I will get Elspeth back for making me miss that – but these two certainly aren't a threat.
The District One escort ends the chain of Reapings, saying, "Happy Sugar Life, and may the odds be ever in your favour!"